State Office Building May Replace Former School

DAYTONA BEACH — The cornerstone says Nov. 1, 1909. Mainland 7th Grade Center looks its age. It is weathered and empty of the sound of footsteps.

By this time next year, the old building could be gone, on its way to being replaced by a state office building -- a modern structure that promises a bright future for downtown Daytona Beach.

A 106,000-square-foot building featuring 80,000 square feet of office space, the proposed facility, which may have as many as five stories, would house all state agencies now leasing space in offices around the Daytona Beach area.

Located on the four-acre Mainland 7th Grade Center site on Bay Street, the building offers the city's stagnated downtown a northern anchor for its redevelopment plans. With as many as 400 employees working in the complex daily, downtown Daytona Beach could witness an increase in shoppers.

''Before you get the retail revitalized downtown, you've got to increase the employee population downtown and the residential population,'' said Gerald Langston, city planning director. ''Retail is always the last and most visible.''

Hopes for quick action on the state office building hinge on the area's four legislators who are watching over this year's state budget which contains a $2 million request to plan the building and buy the property. Including the construction phase, the building will cost more than $11 million.

State Rep. Sam Bell, D-Ormond Beach, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said he will be surprised if the $2 million is cut from the budget. He said a request for the remaining money, mostly construction funds, will be in next year's state budget.

To acquire the property, the state needs to buy it from the Heritage Federal Savings & Loan Association, which paid the Volusia County School Board $450,000 for it Aug. 14. Bill Scaringe, construction chief for the Florida Department of General Services in Tallahassee, said the state will pay the appraised value of the site.

But, Scaringe also said the Mainland site is the ''preferred'' site for the building, not yet the chosen site.

Robert Boerema, director of the state Division of Building Construction and Property Management of the state Department of General Services, said the state hopes to start construction in 1986 and have it completed in 1 1/2 years.

Among state agencies that may move into the new building are the attorney general's office and the departments of Business Regulation, Military Affairs, Health and Rehabilitative Services, Labor and Employment, Law Enforcement, Revenue and Insurance.

According to statistics mailed by Bell to Daytona Beach City Manager Howard Tipton, those agencies now lease 79,539 square feet in Daytona Beach at a cost of more than $428,000 per year. The highest rent is the more than $293,000 paid annually by the Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services for 43,733 square feet in the Masonova Shopping Center and the least is the $1 annually paid by the Department of Military Affairs for 20,961 square feet in the armory on Ballough Road.

Lucille Leigh-Grieder, chairwoman of the seven-person committee recommending the Mainland site as its top choice, said the Bay Street location was preferred because of the cost of acquiring parking, the proximity of public transportation and because it would promote adjacent development in an area needing revitalization. It was also prime territory because the city would not lose a tax base since it previously was a tax-exempt school site.

The southern anchors for the district are the proposed Halifax Harbor Marina project and the 5th District Court of Appeal building.

The marina would feature small specialty shops and restaurants in a nautical setting. With more than 500 boat slips, the marina will become the largest on Florida's east coast. The city and the marina developer, David McGrath, who is also on the convention hotel project, will be ready to proceed after Circuit Judge Bill Johnson validates $20 million in bonds.

The 5th District Court of Appeal building, which opened in 1982, wiped out a decaying corner of downtown and has encouraged the rehabilitation of adjacent structures across the street on Orange Avenue. The law firm of Smalbein, Eubank, Johnson & Bussey has remodeled the old Daytona Beach News- Journal building and two other city businessmen, Bill Crooks and Ralph Schwarz, are redoing buildings next door for retail business space and a new headquarters for Central Florida Legal Services.

The entire block, which can be seen from the windows of the appeal court, centered until recently on a cheap hotel and a rundown bar. Three years ago, it was the site of an adult bookstore.

In between the northern and southern sectors, private buildings are going up such as the new office complex of May Zima & Co., an accounting firm. Known as City Center, the complex also contains the future offices of the law firm of Kinsey, Pyle, Williams & Tumbleson.

Across the street from the City Center complex at the corner of Palmetto and Magnolia avenues is the new headquarters of the law firm of Cobb & Cole, which opened early this year. On an opposite corner of the same intersection is the Magnolia Avenue Grille, a new restaurant in the building that formerly housed the Beef & Bottle.